Sample cohort brief
This is the brief you would receive: every organization in your cohort on one page, measured the same way, so you can show your board and funders where each one starts and, a year later, what changed.
Across the 10 organizations, we would screen 7,889 funders that have already funded organizations of the same focus, size and state.
| Organization | State | Funders screened | Can apply to | Screened out | Named to check |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Organization A | CA | 3,290 | 2,402 | 797 | 5 |
| Organization B | CA | 1,933 | 1,493 | 384 | 5 |
| Organization C | CA | 992 | 723 | 245 | 5 |
| Organization D | CA | 807 | 618 | 169 | 5 |
| Organization E | CA | 296 | 242 | 47 | 5 |
| Organization F | CA | 192 | 143 | 46 | 5 |
| Organization G | TX | 156 | 112 | 39 | 5 |
| Organization H | IA | 94 | 69 | 20 | 5 |
| Organization I | DC | 75 | 46 | 25 | 5 |
| Organization J | CA | 54 | 36 | 17 | 5 |
"Can apply to" means a private or community foundation that accepts applications. It does not mean the organization will be funded. The named funders are the short list worth checking before anyone writes.
These are facts about what each funder is, not judgments about your organizations.
| Reason | Funders | Share |
|---|---|---|
| A public charity, which raises money rather than granting it | 1,274 | 71% |
| An operating foundation, which spends on its own programs | 170 | 10% |
| A donor-advised fund sponsor, where the donor picks the grantee | 114 | 6% |
| A supporting organization tied to one beneficiary | 97 | 5% |
| Not a charitable grantmaker | 91 | 5% |
| A pass-through that regrants to a fixed list | 37 | 2% |
| A government body, which funds through its own programs | 6 | 0% |
In this sample, 23% of the funders on the cohort's combined list could not make these organizations a grant at all. At 20 to 30 hours per application, that is 460 to 690 hours for every 100 applications built from an unscreened list.
The 20 to 30 hours is our planning figure for one application, not a measurement of any cohort.
Each organization gets one score out of 100 for how the funding behind its mission looks today, built from its own public filings. In this sample the cohort runs from 60 to 65, with a middle value of 64.5.
| Organization | Score | Position | Funder market | Named to check |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Organization B | 65 | Building | Moderate | 5 |
| Organization C | 65 | Building | Moderate | 5 |
| Organization E | 65 | Building | Limited | 5 |
| Organization G | 65 | Building | High | 5 |
| Organization J | 65 | Building | High | 5 |
| Organization D | 64 | Building | High | 5 |
| Organization A | 61 | Building | High | 5 |
| Organization H | 61 | Building | High | 5 |
| Organization F | 60 | Building | Limited | 5 |
| Organization I | 60 | Building | Limited | 5 |
Building means a score of 50 to 69: the funding holds today, and the pipeline that protects it is still being built. Funder market is how much comparable grant activity the public record shows for organizations like this one. Three of the 10 sit in a limited or thin market, where more applications is the wrong move and checking the few real funders is the right one.
This is your baseline. At the end of the year we run the brief again for the same 10 organizations, and the change for each one is what you report to your board and funders.
Sources: each organization's own public filings, and funder award records.